Qlix Magazine | Emerging fashion designers, photographers, stylists and editors from United States and Europe.

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This week’s smartest individual is Julie Kaye, an emerging visual artist whose talent is intriguing, unabridged works of illustrative art.

Tell us a bit about who Julie Kaye is and the inspiration behind your works.

Who am I? I am a visually creative creature and a really bad cook. My artwork contains layers of interpretation that are often in direct contrast with each other. It’s like having a yes and no within the same piece and I feel this is the direct result of the human condition. We as humans are of course complete contradictions. We make little sense and the result is a reflection of this in my art. So what I like to do is take my thoughts, daily, and let them form some real art.

At the moment I am inspired by the extreme. This is because in every aspect of life there exists a complete opposite. In our emotions, in politics, in love and so on and so on and so on. It’s as much a part of our existence and understanding as anything else. My work deals with stark contrasts. The more extreme the better. Typically extremes are not seen as “feminine” but as the male and female psyche which have drawn closer to each other by the advent of technology and societal changes, I feel more comfortable being feminine and extreme. I want to explore this further, not just in my art but also in my life.

I am sometimes forced to be inspired by things that I would rather not be. Traumatic real life events close to me. One of my closest friends survived being shot 4 years ago, the officer with her died. It was a very publicised event. I think the trauma of it settled in some of my work. I also witnessed a suicide on the underground and it’s something I dealt with but it still found its way into my creative thinking for a while. In my art life, events have an outlet even if I would rather they had never existed. On the flip side of this of course there are a great deal good times that influence my work too.

Qlix is about emerging talent/concepts within the fashion industry, as an emerging visual artist what contribution(s) do you feel your style of illustration could bring to the fashion industry?

I paint the fashion into my art and not the other way around. Art creates its own brief naturally so in that respect I am not an illustrator but an artist. I choose the designers and photographers I like to fit my vision. I want my art to own you when you view it. I want to possess you and control how your eyes move across my artistic skin. And I create with this intention at the core of my expression.

I catch myself looking at the “Geisha Gun” illustration over and over again. What were you thinking about or influenced from when you created this piece?

I was reading articles about women on the front line and I am fascinated by singularity, the joining of man and machine. I am also intrigued by geisha. Here we have woman whose sole purpose is to denote pleasure and entertainment to those who seek it. The gun in this instance is both phallic and representative of her power.

The contrasts that exist here are of a women who is both the fighter and the submissive, the body and the machine, nature and man made, present and past.

The last two questions of an interview, I always like to “lighten” things up a bit and ask random, fun questions…as a child did you use to write on the walls?

Not on walls. I drew and painted on my wardrobe, it was completely covered. I saved painting on walls for when I became an ‘adult’.

If you were only allowed to use one type of material to create your art, what would it be and why?

Black Ink. I love the control I have over it and its versatility. And by the way I used black ink to paint my wardrobe as a child, so we have been in a serious relationship for a long time.

image courtesy of Julie Kaye